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Grassroots Green
by Lee H Goldberg
I’m having a great time watching multi-billion-dollar corporations from General Electric to IBM embracing green energy as a core part of their business strategy: technologies that they would not have touched with a 10-foot pole a few years ago. Whether these companies are motivated by ever-tighter regulations, ever-rising energy costs, or the billions of dollars in economic stimulus money being doled out for green energy projects, the technologies, products, and business practices they are developing will eventually make a big dent in our collective environmental footprint. But as exciting as all these top-down corporate efforts are, there are innovative developments going on at the grassroots level whose ingenuity and long-term impact rivals any billion-dollar program.
Take for example my college buddy, Steve, who runs a small factory in Brattleboro, VT, that makes high-efficiency doors and windows. Being the sort of guy he is, Steve has spent the last 20 years figuring out how to make his products more energy-efficient and last longer. As a result, the stuff he makes today has some of the highest energy efficiency ratings in the business and boasts a nominal design life of over 100 years. But that’s not good enough for Steve. He also spent over a decade massaging his supply chain, locating sources of sustainable-harvested hardwood, non-toxic glues and eco-friendly finishes that are as durable and as beautiful as the products they protect.
When he first started greening his products, Steve was doing it simply because he believed it was the right thing to do: and an interesting challenge. This changed a few years ago when energy efficiency and LEED certification finally became mainstream ideas and maybe one of the biggest reasons that his annual sales have grown so quickly of late and he still enjoys a one year backlog of work.
At the same time, Steve put a great deal effort into updating the systems in the 100+ year old organ factory his operation is housed in to minimize its energy consumption. In addition to the usual insulation and high-efficiency lighting retrofits, Steve invested in a high-tech wood furnace that uses wood pellets made from the sawdust generated by the manufacturing operation.
The sawdust is mixed with whatever waste paper and junk mail arrives from the office and compressed at 10,000 psi into briquettes. The furnace uses a gasification process to burn the pellets cleanly and efficiently. It’s so efficient, in fact, that only 25% of the factory’s sawdust output is required to keep it toasty warm all winter long. There’s enough surplus that Steve lets his employees take some home to use in their wood stoves and sells the rest at a tidy profit. He won’t be selling those surplus pellets for long, however, if his plans for a wood gas-powered generator rig materialize and he starts making most of the electricity he needs to run his lights and machines.
Not far from Steve’s factory, in Greenfield, MA, there’s another exciting grassroots green-tech effort underway called the One-Gallon Challenge. Scheduled to kick off August 20, 2009, the idea behind the Challenge is to assemble a bunch of home-built experimental vehicles which will try to use a single gallon of gas to go from Greenfield to the Boston Green Fest over 100 miles of country roads. So far, five vehicles have signed up for the rally and the event’s organizers hope to have over a dozen on board by August. The construction and technology that goes into the vehicles range from bubble-enclosed trikes – powered by motor scooter engines – to slick composite land missiles that use a hybrid gasoline/electric/pedal propulsion system.
While most of the vehicles running the One-Gallon Challenge will not be practical for everyday use by the average American, the design concepts and technologies they explore will play a role in shaping the cars that roll off the showroom floor a decade from now. And most of these cars are developed on a budget that’s smaller than the catering bill that Ford, Toyota, or Daimler runs up while they exhibit their wares at a major auto show.
It’s going to take both large corporate initiatives and grassroots-level efforts to heal the economy and the environment while building a sustainable future for the next crop of tinkerers and dreamers. I’m just hoping that the billions we invest in massive federal programs get used somewhere near as efficiently and imaginatively as my buddy Steve and his neighbors at the One Gallon Challenge have managed to.
With any luck, I’ll swing by Greenfield this August to help cheer on the drivers and their 100 mpg home-brew vehicles and then stop by for a visit with Steve before I head off to the Boston Green festival. If you’re going to be there too, keep an eye out for me and be sure to say hi when you spot the heavyset guy with the beard, sandals and Hawaiian shirt. Steve and I would love to buy you a beer and hear about your own grassroots green initiatives.
Comments? Questions? Other examples of DIY Green you’d like to share?
Write me at lhg at en-genius dot net or post your comments on our blog.
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